Companies typically have difficulties tracking jobsite items (including tools, equipment, instruments, parts, components, direct materials, etc.) and their usage within their facilities. Many jobsite items are misused, misplaced, and improperly tracked and replenished by the employees of the companies. For example, the General Contractors of California report that 85% of all jobsite item thefts are employee-related. Losing these jobsite items adversely affects the operation of a jobsite in various ways, including but not limited to monetary loss, project delays, loss production, duplicate orders, increased administrative cost, and increased insurance premiums.
The problem escalates when outside of a controlled environment such as a facility. Jobsite equipment and inventory theft is significant with industry loss estimates up to one billion dollars annually, according to a 2003 National Equipment Register study. Tool tracking and management systems provide one level of security, but a large percentage of theft includes jobsite items disappearing from jobsites at the end of the workday. Generally, only limited resources may be allocated to management of jobsite items at the perimeter of a controlled space such as a facility or an outdoor temporary worksite. Although manned jobsite perimeter security and personal inspection of workers is one option, providing the dedicated resources for such manned security is usually too costly to be considered. With many jobsites operating with aggressive deadlines on a 24-hour per day schedule, providing a security guard at every exit for multiple shifts throughout the day and night is not a viable option. Furthermore, manual inspection of workers would severely bottleneck exiting personnel during a shift change or other heavy traffic times, leading to further inefficiencies in the process.
Some contemporary solutions to this problem include security portals activated by special electronic article surveillance (“EAS”) security tags. Similar to retail environments, in practice, the portal sounds an alarm when an EAS tagged jobsite item passes through it. These portals must generally be carefully set up and aligned properly at every entry and exit point of a jobsite to ensure that accurate detection of the EAS security tags occurs. This set up process is time consuming and expensive, and is not a reasonably effective option for preventing jobsite item theft at temporary jobsites such as construction jobsites. Moreover, these portals may be significantly affected by harsh environmental conditions at a jobsite and become inoperable or damaged during use. Furthermore, these solutions still lack the tracking and access control that is beneficial on a jobsite with combinations of employees and contractors, as well as ease and portability of the secured area.
In another example, some jobsites store high-value jobsite items in a further controlled space with electronic access control systems configured to limit exposure of such jobsite items to certain personnel. However, these systems generally do not track inventory or other jobsite items on an individual level, and any tracking that is conducted is usually performed manually. These arrangements still do not solve the problem of jobsite item theft and add more inefficiencies to the security process.
Therefore there is a need in the art for a system, apparatus and method that detects and discourages jobsite item theft or unauthorized removal, which is conveniently portable and insulated from harsh environmental conditions.